San Francisco Starfleet Headquarters 2252, 261

"Lieutenant, are you certain this is the call you want to make?"

"Decidedly."

"We'll be sorry to lose you – you preformed beyond any possible expectation, given the circumstances."

"Circumstances which could have been avoided, Sir."

Marcus raised a brow, his eyes locked with Evelette's as she stood in her blue dress, stiff and drained looking from lack of sleep. She looked less than a two blink jump from snapping all together – her expected resignation was clearly taking its toll.

"The Chief Medical officer, Lieutenant Commander Orthos felt the threat was minimal – there was no way of predicting the virus's ability to mutate."

"Then it should not have been tampered with. Sir." She swallowed, wincing.

"Is that your professional opinion Lieutenant?"

"Sir."

"And why didn't you express said opinion earlier, Lieutenant?"

Evelette blinked, head twitching to one side as she frowned. Her mind was struggling to insure she'd heard him correctly. "Sir… I reported to you when Medical Chief Orthos agreed to study the virus, I explained the threat of mutation."

"I don't remember any such conversation."

"Sir, it was on the bridge, everyone heard -"

"Do you have anyone who can attest to this supposed conversation?" Marcus waited with mock expectation as she stared at him blankly. "No? I think you'll find my crew will comply with my report, that the medical team unanimously agreed the virus had no threat when experimentation began. Oh, don't look so wounded Lieutenant, I gave you a glowing report with how you dealt with the dead and dying after Medical Chief Orthos was killed. No one is going to come pointing fingers your way anyhow."

"But it's a lie!" She bleated, looking about as if there were someone else in the captain's office. She took a step closer to Marcus imploringly. "Sir – there were three vials left of the virus that Chief Orthos was saving for further testing, but there's no record of them in any of the reports. Please, tell me they've been disposed of accordingly?"

"Lieutenant, what would be the point in saving a virus you've already synthesised a cure for?" Marcus smiled coldly.

"It's capability to mutate means my cure wouldn't work on a second outbreak." She said urgently. "Sir, I'm resigning because it was in no way Starfleet mandate to study any sort of potential Biological Agent – the production of biological weaponry, not to mention weaponry of any kind, is against everything Starfleet ever stood for. I'm resigning my post, but if I think your planning on continuing research on the Deep Space Virus -"

"It's been disposed of, Lieutenant." Marcus cut across her threat. "And I don't appreciate your insinuating that I have any kind of desire to weaponize the virus that killed half my crew. Your resignation is accepted, you are relieved. Now get the hell out of my office, and take the bonus Starfleet is offering you to start your own practice, Doctor Swan. You're a damn good scientist - make yourself useful here."

She stood a moment, pinned between instinct to follow orders and overwhelming doubt that Marcus was telling her the truth. She'd watched him bully Orthos into examining the virus, which would be pointless outside of investigating it's potential to be controlled. He'd laughed at her concern as she begged him on the bridge to reconsider.

And now he was throwing money in her face and telling her to go away.

Reluctantly, she straightened and saluted. He nodded, already busy looking at a new report coming in and waving his hand to suggest she leave. Eve took a long look at the former captain, then left the office. She took the elevator to street level, moving out into the blasting heat. She looked around at the sea of cadets and lieutenants, commanders and captains. Starfleet was a hub of the young and eager, everyone wanting to make their mark on the universe.

She was young for a lieutenant, her intelligence having advanced her. But she felt suddenly the most ancient of anyone planet side, her illusions stripped away. Whatever Starfleet was meant to be, this flight into the edges of Deep Space had changed everything.

Starfleet was going to rot from the core outward, until exploration became conquering.

She looked down at the pin on her chest, the small silver insignia of Starfleet. She pulled it from the fabric, turning it over in her hands. She let it sit for a moment, face up, and then headed down the steps. She pulled out the long pin from her hair, letting it fall against her shoulders. As she passed a trash compactor, she threw the silver pin away.

Underground 2259, 55.

Evelette's skin felt like the cells had all been hyper charged, bashing into one another and barely managing to hold it together. There was a strange taste in her mouth, like the smell of heated metal. And she was cold – freezing cold.

It took a long time to get her eyes to open. Her body was stiff and uncomfortable, as if her dimensions had changed in the time from leaving her office to the present. Her vision was still blurred, and that to took time to clear and focus.

She could see a table, steel framing a glass surface littered with scans. There was a wall of screens, illustrating data she instantly recognized as John's. She could only see a fraction of what was there, laying in a sort of alcove on a flatly padded black bench. Her muscles shivered so her arm trembled as she pushed herself up, pulling her arms around herself as she realized her jacket was gone. Her green sweater was made of thin material, and the cold of the room had leeched into her as she slept.

No, not slept. As she was passed out.

Carefully she swung her legs over the side of the bed. She tried to get to her feet, but staggered and fell back against the bench. She gasped as pain shot up her spine, and clenched her eyes shut for a moment as she gripped the bench, waiting for the pain to pass.

She could remember Orthos' reports now, as they made their laps around her brain. Old stashes of words she'd long since put to rest.

The virus attacks the central nervous system first, primarily the spinal cord, debilitating the victim into a paralytic state.

Eventually she was able to release the bench, lifting one of her hands to touch her neck where John had stabbed her with the injector. She could feel a small raised bump where the skin had healed over.

There were a hundred things he could have given her, but she was beginning to learn better than to doubt the simplest answer.

She had been right to quit the first time. The virus lived on.

And that arrogant three hundred year old bastard had infected her with it. How he had even come to possess a vial she didn't want to wonder about, but the fact that he had used the only palpable thing in the universe she was genuinely afraid of…

"John?" Her called out, her voice hoarse. When no one answered, she forced herself to be louder, "Come out here to coward!"

Nothing but a sore throat. She pressed her feet against the ground, but they were still useless. She managed to pull them back up, laying back down. She waited for a long time, drifting in and out of sleep. Her skin stopped tingling, and after realizing the taste on her tongue was probably from the stages of coughing up blood, her determination to get up overpowered her fear of falling again.

Bracing herself, she returned her feet to the floor. Her legs shook as she stood, using the bench as best she could to support herself. She let herself adjust, then let go of the seat and straightened. She walked toward the table, reaching it after a painfully long time. It was a relief, though, to have something to put her weight on.

She spread out the sheets, showing a mapping of John's brain. It showed the chip, to, sitting at the top of his brain as promised. Judging by its size in relation to his brain on the page, it looked to be the size of a thumbnail. Not so hard to miss, when inserting a spike into the human brain.

Eve had established in her time with John that his abilities weren't controlled primarily by the brain – rather each cell responded due to alteration of his genetic code – but the idea of shoving a sharp rod into his skull and swirling it around attempting to fracture a computer chip made her feel nauseated.

Or maybe that was still the virus talking.

Leaning on the table, she looked around the rest of the room. There was another table with a chair, and plenty more screens detailing everything known about John Harrison, but that was all. Thick cement walls and floors, and a silver door across the room.

The journey to which was extremely unamusing. By the time she reached it she had broken into a slight sweat. She looked for a panel, but there was none. She hit the door, just in case, but it seemed to cause her more pain than the metal. She managed to make it back to the chair, but all the muscles of her legs were twinging unpleasantly and she was panting. She groaned, laying her head against the table.

She was hungry, and cold, and angry.

When the door opened, she snapped up in time to look like she was embarrassed she was exhausted, earning her a look of disapproval from John as he strode in. "Ah, good, you're awake. We'll need to get started right away, this place won't be secure for much longer and they are no doubt getting close to tapping into this chip again."

"Your chip," She said venomously. "You think I give a damn about your chip? You infected me with the Deep Space Virus, and you want to talk about your chip?"

She pushed herself up, storming towards him as he stood with brows raised. He didn't flinch as she lifted a hand, slamming it as hard as she could against his chest. She swung the other one, but only managed a few feeble hits before she was panting and dizzy.

"Do you feel satisfied?" John asked critically.

"Oh go contract a case of decapitation." She snarled, but she groaned and pitched dangerously to the right. He moved forward, steadying her and then picking her up, ignoring as she began shouting, "Don't touch me!"

There was nothing chivalric in the way he held her, striding across the room. He likely would have hoisted her over his shoulder had it been more convenient, and the way he dropped her on the bench was entirely lacking in gentlemanly sensitivity. She gasped as pain lurched up her back again, distracting her long enough to keep her from fighting him as she rolled up her sleeve, pressing an injector to the flesh and driving it in.

She didn't look over till it was done, glaring at him as he placed the injector aside and pulled her sleeve back down. "The serum you created from my blood – you're cure was convenient while I had no need of you, but it's time to move this along."

"While you had no need of me." She laughed darkly. "And should I expect reinfection when I reassume that designation?"

He shook his head, as if she were being childish. "Hardly. I only brought one sample of the virus with me."